


To the Brink

by aestheticly_cat



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, F/M, Forgiveness, I will add tags as I go, Insecurity, Redemption, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-11-03 18:56:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17883413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aestheticly_cat/pseuds/aestheticly_cat
Summary: Evolet Reynolds did not believe in magic, or fate, or anything else without definitive answers or solutions. She liked knowing that the answers to her endless questions were out there somewhere in the universe, dangling from the ends of constellations like mobile figurines.When Director Fury drops a very bitter, very blue, alien in the middle of her living room, Evolet's world of black and white, right and wrong, ends abruptly and without warning.Tasked with prying out the dark secrets of a war criminal born of two worlds, and grieving a devastating loss, Evolet is distinctly aware of how unqualified she is for the job. Things only get more complicated when her charge begins to open up, and introduces Evolet to hidden galaxies millions of miles away, and some that have been right in front of her the entire time.





	To the Brink

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for stopping by to check out my story! I would love to know how you're enjoying it as you go along, so don't be afraid to leave a review! ❤︎
> 
> Just a few things before you get started:
> 
> 1\. This story is rated mature and will feature mature themes such as violence, explicit language, and sexual situations. 
> 
> 2\. Thor never took Loki back to Asgard at the end of The Avengers (2012). Loki has been languishing in a S.H.I.E.L.D  prison cell since his capture. 
> 
> 3\. Evolet is pansexual. This will be discussed, so if that bothers you, I wouldn't read any further. 
> 
> 4\. My version of Loki will probably come off as out of character more often than not, as I feel like the emotional and physical trauma he has suffered (as well as his three month vacay at Hôtel de Shield) will have altered his mental state to something resembling how he appeared in the Asgardian prison after his mother's death in Thor: The Dark Word (2013). 
> 
> 5\. I love Thor. Really. I adore that ginormous, pop tart inhaling, coffee mug throwing ☕︎, thunder lord more than my grandmother loves wedding cake. However, I do feel like he contributed a lot to Loki's general sense of self-loathing and insecurity growing up, so he kind of comes off as a douche at times. 
> 
> 6\. Lastly, Odin is his own warning. 
> 
>    
> That's all, folks! Happy reading! ❤︎

 

**“Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.”**

**-Edna St. Vincent**

 

 

 

_Red. Pain. A child screaming. Somewhere nearby, rapid gunfire._

_"Reynolds! Get up, goddamn it. Get up!"_

_She wants to. She knows she has to, but she can't seem to find her legs. She knows they were there a moment ago. Before the pain and the red and the screaming._

_"Listen to me! You are not dead. We are not dead, but we will be if you do not get up right now."_

_She knows that voice. A woman. Someone important. She cares about this person. If she doesn't get up, the woman will die. She has to get up._

_She finds her right arm first, and holds it up in the direction that the voice came from. A familiar, callused hand grasps tight and starts to pull her up, up, up._

_Out of the darkness._

_Right before they reach the light, an explosion. Clenched hands torn apart. Spiraling back into the abyss._

_"Sam!"_  

 

Evolet jolts upright in her bed, gasping as if she'd been running and not sleeping. She can feel the sweat plastering her tank top to her body, and the dampness of the sheets tangled around her legs.

The nightmare. Again.

No. The memory.

Pulling her aching body out of the bed, she checks the time. 3:02 a.m. blinks back at her mockingly. Groaning in frustration, Evolet strips the sheets from the bed and heads into her en-suite bathroom to shower off the stench of fear she can smell clinging to her skin in lieu of the nightmare.

She exits the shower, wrapping the fluffy white towel tight around her now chilled body. Padding into her bedroom, she changes into new pajamas, changes her sheets, and lies back down with her head towards the end of her bed.

The New York skyline glimmers against the black sky, the lights from the skyscrapers the only visible stars. Evolet tries to think back on how the stars looked from her bedroom at her parent's home in North Carolina, but far too many years have passed since she set foot in her childhood home, and her mind comes up blank.

From this far up, she can almost pretend that the horror that swept through the city not even three months prior never happened. Here, from the safety of her bed, the city almost seems normal.

Like it was before everyone knew that gods and heroes were real and rejoiced.

Like it was before they realized that the devils and monsters were real, too.

The memorial for all those who died during the Battle of New York stands in Central Park. Evolet doesn't like to think of all the names. One name, in particular, if she's being honest with herself.

Rolling over, she reaches for her S.H.I.E.L.D issued phone and opens her latest message.

Fury: Dropping by with a new assignment for you at 07:00. Have coffee.

Evolet huffs and throws one arm over her eyes.

"That's not cryptic, at all, Nick," she mutters into her elbow.

Her first assignment since the Chitauri invasion. Her first assignment since _Sam_.

The name sends a sharp jolt of agony racing through her chest, searing down her spine. She knows a bullet would hurt less.

Curling up on her side to peer out into the illuminated darkness of New York, Evolet presses a hand to her aching chest and counts her heartbeats until she falls back to sleep.

This time, she does not dream.

 

 

~~~

 

 

Evolet wakes  to the sound of her alarm clock, and just barely manages to stop herself from flinging it into the wall.

Groaning, she rolls out of bed, snatching up her phone as she heads into the bathroom for her morning ritual of making herself appear a little less like the Thing That Crawled out of the Swamp.

She finishes getting ready, and pauses for a moment. She grips the sides of her porcelain sink and stares into her own eyes in the gilded mirror that hangs above it.

Evolet surveys herself for a few moments, taking in the face she’s been avoiding looking at for months now. 

The circles under her eyes are prominent, but they aren’t as noticeable as she had feared they would be. Her lips, a little chapped, but they are no longer worried bloody, and despite the constant thrum of pain beneath her breastbone, her face appears to be devoid of any distress at all.

She appears as if unchanged.

As if the universe didn’t turn on its head three months ago and fling her back to Earth hard enough to shatter her into a billion, microscopic pieces. 

' _How_ _strange_ ,' she thinks to herself as she picks her way to the kitchen, ' _that_ _I_ _look_ _almost_ _exactly_ _the_ _same_.'

Evolet nurses a cup of strong black coffee as she watches the clock tick. She wonders absently about her new assignment, but doesn't give it much thought. Whatever it is, she'll handle it. She has to. There's no one left to save her.

As the clock hand hits 7:00 a.m., three sharp knocks come down on her door from the hallway.

"It's open, Fury!" Evolet calls over her shoulder as she continues to watch the clock. Fury has known her long enough not to expect anything hospitable, or friendly, from her this early in the day.

She hears the familiar sound of Fury's black boots on wood and the soft fluttering sound his trench coat makes as he moves towards her place on one of the bar stools at the island countertop.

She doesn't turn to look at him.

She's wondering if the clock hands are starting to move slower now, or if it's just a side effect of not blinking.

Evolet registers a dark hand reaching out for the coffee pot, and knows that two sugars and one cream will follow.

Fury lets out a content sigh as he sips his coffee, and Evolet can feel his dark, knowing eyes scorching the side of her face, but she can't look at him now.

The clock hands are definitely moving slower.

"Damn fine coffee as always, Reynolds," Fury states, leaning against the countertop across from her post at the island countertop.

"I'm glad you think so, sir," Evolet replies. She reluctantly drags her eyes from the clock to look at Fury. "But I'm pretty sure you didn't come here to talk about my outstanding coffee-making abilities."

One dark eyebrow raises as Fury's one eye appraises her over the rim of his mug.

"Still not a morning person, I see," he drawls before he drains the last of his coffee.

Evolet says nothing. Just waits.

Fury turns to the kitchen sink to rinse his mug out.

"I've got a new assignment for you. It's not like anything I've asked of you before, but you're the only person that I can trust with this job, Reynolds."

Evolet follows his movements as he places the mug on the rack to dry and turns to face her.

"You're not gunna like it," Fury admits after a pause.

Evolet feels her body tense. She sits up straighter and raises her chin to meet Fury's gaze head on.

"If this is a Widow assignment, with all due respect, sir, you're going to have to find someone else. I don't sleep with targets. You know that," she says cooly, her eyes narrowed with tension.

Fury is shaking his head before she's even finished speaking.

"No, it's not a Widow assignment, Reynolds," Fury clarifies.

Relief seeps the tension from Evolet's slight frame for a moment, but then Fury speaks again and it sounds like ripping another hole in the sky.

"It has to do with Loki Laufeyson."

The words register and it's like the sudden removal of a hidden jagged knife that's been lodged in her chest ripping her open, and white hot agony engulfs her entire body.

' _Sam_!' A voice, that sounds oddly like her own, wails from within Evolet's chest cavity where the wound burns the hottest.

In her mind's eye she sees Sam throwing her down onto the training mat hard enough to jar her brain in her skull. 

Sam barking orders. Busting her lip. Bruising her jaw.

In the next moment, Sam's hands suddenly gentled as they tilt her chin up to check the damage.

Sam's husky voice in Evolet's ear, even as she takes her down again, saying, "You're learning, Reynolds."

Sam's body pressed up against hers. Lips pressed against the nape of her neck in the middle of the night. 

 _A_ _hand_ _reaching_ _into_ _the_ _darkness_.

Evolet grips the countertop with her hands to ground herself as pain and desolation war for dominance within her.

Fury watches her, and he waits.

Evolet unclenches her teeth, "What could you possibly need from him that I can get you."

She knows that if she were standing in front of a mirror right now that her eyes would be two black holes of pure torment. She knows that this is what was missing when she looked in the mirror earlier. This is what was hiding beneath the surface.

Fury watches her with something that looks like pity in his dark eyes.

Evolet wants to hate him.

But he's all that's left of her life from before. Her life with Sam.

"We've had him for almost three months now, and he hasn't said a word. Not a fucking one," Fury growls.

"We need information on what's out there. We've already interrogated Thor Odinson, but he only confirmed what we already suspected. That if there's something out there to be concerned about, Loki will know about it."

Fury pauses, and surveys the way Evolet's fingertips have gone white from how tightly she's holding onto the countertop. Something in his expression gentles.

"I know what you lost, Reynolds," he says, quieter than Evolet's ever heard him. "What he took from you. I know what I'm asking you to do, and if I saw another way-" Fury breaks off, in an uncharacteristic display of emotion.

It’s not much, but it keeps Evolet from throwing him off the balcony.

Evolet slowly releases the countertop and flexes her stiff, aching fingers. She takes stock of her body in the aftermath of her sudden, vicious grief, and finds that the pain has receded back into whatever dark hole it hides itself in.

Evolet looks to the clock once more.

The hands now seem to be going faster than she's ever seen before.

Evolet's not sure if this makes her feel better or worse.

She meets Fury's gaze.

"What do you need me to do?"


End file.
